Back when the late Michael Jackson was content to be black, he made a famous music video called Thiller in which the singer transforms into one of the Undead. The makeup artist, Lance Anderson, used a similar slate-gray pancake to portray the bloodless pallor of the brain-seeking zombies of the African-American persuasion.

The alleged Michelle looks like she's just feasted on Charles Murray's noodle.

Entirely apart from the lack of resemblance, it just isn't a very good rendering of a face either. Shading on the arms is amateurish as well, or at least, in a style that reads as amateurish to me.

Regarding the resemblance, somewhat ironically, precisely because she is not a particularly beautiful woman, and her features are quite heavy, I would tend to think her easier to render than a great beauty, where the regularity and delicacy of features cause difficulty (at least for me). Maybe that shades into caricature, but all portraiture has some element of caricature in it, even if it is subdued. And the dramatic protrusion of her brow, the sharp tilt of her eyebrows, the closeness of her upper lip to the bottom of her nose, and the wrinkling of her cheeks when she smiles all offer opportunities to draw out that resemblance. Portrait isn't smiling, I guess, so strike those off the list. But the artist took none of those other opportunities.

I don't see it as an insult; he wasn't saying anything about Michelle Obama's attractiveness one way or another. He was merely stating something obvious to pretty much everyone who has seen both that portrait and Mrs. Obama: That ain't her.

Both portraits are interesting, weird, unique and certainly not your ordinary Presidential portrait. They talk about Trump bucking the "presidential" traditions. These just kick tradition in the balls. I don't really care for either one, but if I had to pick, I like Michelle's painter's style more.

Michelle is a sort of Pop Art style like Andy Warhol doing Campbell's Soup cans... and it does not look very much like her. Whether that is a bad or good thing...who knows.

Obama looks like an album cover from the 1960's. All psychedelic and groovy (as in the cool word of those days). He even looks like he is coming down from a rather bad trip. I wonder what that says about the portrayal of the inner Obama? Maybe I'm just remembering my own misspent youth.

The actual portraits seem to be ginormous in size. I wonder if all the the other official portraits are that size, if there were given some parameters as to dimensions or if the Obamas just said, screw it we can do what we want.

I didn't for President Obama, but I have no beef with him or his wife, the former First Lady.

Not everything has to be politicized. They deserve good formal portraits for the White House.

Now, I'm looking at Michelle Obama's portrait, and I'm getting that same sensation when my daughter, at a young age, would present to me one of her Godawful paintings, with a smile on her face, whereupon I would lie and say, "Wow, it looks beautiful Honey!"

It's a goofy portrait. But if MO likes it, I guess that ends the inquiry.

You mean seriously the Obamas could not afford a Canon or a Nikon or a young professional photographer who would do it for the chops FOR FREE and get a decent photograph compared to that? I think they made a mistake and will NEVER admit that. Ever.

"Aside from questions of technique and skill, above all, we desire images that are portraits first and which concentrate on creating a likeness of the sitter instead of fulfilling some other purpose. Accuracy, allowing always for artistic license! is important but so also is obtaining an image that speaks to the character and nature of the individual. The likeness is the end result of the portrait and we are careful to avoid portraits becoming the means to another purpose, one which uses visual clichés to trigger a political or cultural response like a piece of propaganda."

BO's is interesting and pretty accurate, although hiding in the ivy doesn't do much for me. Whoever did Michelle will not have a career as a portrait painter. Michelle has a strong and interesting face; this painting doesn't come close.

As Sato Issais wrote about his portrait at 51--even that. which faills to resemble me may capture the essence of what I am--the one of Barack gets some of his essence but the portrait of Michelle misses the mark. They would have done better to pick our local very fine portrait painter Phil Salamone-- even though he is not black.

Problem with portraiture: a really good artist will not give you veto power over what she/he does w/ your image. If you can influence the portraitist to flatter you, the portraitist has no integrity. If you can't, prepare to wince & cringe & as soon as you can get rid of portrait

Robert Cook said...Actually, as a portrait , it's terrible. The artist didn't get her likeness, and the technique looks uncertain. The black and white design is striking, however.

2/12/18, 4:44 PM

100%. If there was a nationwide BOLO/manhunt for the Obamas, and I were assigned to stop people who look like this, I would not stop Mrs Obama based on this likeness. The portrait of former President Obama, I have not seen yet.

They might as well have had George W. Bush paint them. I bet he would have been tender to them. They deserve better, and the country deserves better. It dumbly bespeaks a desire for effacement, to be forgotten or left alone.

Let's have a national contest. Let the photograph that this was these were based on be released to the public, and that anyone who is capable and willing to submit a 36 by 48 oil painting or whatever is desired can send it in and they can be judged and the best one hung. Even if the contest were only open to Obama voters, someone can do better than this.

She's certainly poorly served by it. It looks like tattoo art. However you feel about Bark and his missus they are historic figures and they, and the country, deserve something with both quality and dignity. I'm very surprised she'd find this acceptable.

Will folks be jabbering about interpreting this portrait for more than five hundred years, Mona-style?

No. Folks will be occupied w/ their current. Even the signposts of our current will only be trivia.

Which -- glass half full -- is good for all y'all. That means nobody will bother assessing your backwardness (even by today's standards) that is being typed out here. Likewise, lucky for Althouse that she (like all of us) will forever lost to the realness of the day, in the future.